21.05.03

Statement by Lorenzo Guadagnucci & more

12 May 2003

STATEMENT BY LORENZO GUADAGNUCCI
Author of "Noi della Diaz", member of the Committee "Truth and Justice for Genoa"

Now, at least, will someone find the courage to be ashamed? Will someone finally apologise and demand truth and justice? Or will even this dismissal not be enough for the police authorities, for the government?

On 21st July 2001, in the Diaz school, we were brutally beaten up and arrested on the basis of fabricated evidence (the two molotov cocktails were brought there by the police themselves), then we were even accused of attacking the policemen: all this is false, as the magistrate in charge of preliminary investigations now certifies. Do we or do we not have the right to moral, as well as judicial, compensation? We would like the same people who then ordered or accepted that operation, to now say that it was a mistake, an illegal action, an attack on democracy even more than on those 93 defenceless people. Almost two years have gone by, and the country's highest authorities have never really dissociated themselves from that episode, no one has ever been willing to explain how come it was decided and by whom. They have remained silent, they have covered, to some extent legitimated what happened, thus compromising the credibility of the country's offices and soiling even the honour of that majority of honest officers who work in the state police.

Now we are awaiting a trial for those responsible for the beating and for the lies that preceded, accompanied and followed it: will people in Italy finally realise that this is something which concerns everyone? That this is a matter of democracy and respect for the constitutional state?

COMITATO VERITA' E GIUSTIZIA PER GENOVA

(honorary chairman Giulietto Chiesa, chairwoman Enrica Bartesaghi)

Press release

Monday, 12th May 2003

NOW WE WANT TO KNOW WHY

The acquittal of the 93 people beaten up in the Diaz school (in the night of 21 July 2001) from the accusations of resistance and acts of violence is a first step towards the reconstruction of Truth and Justice on what took place in July 2001 in Genoa. We are still awaiting dismissal for the other ridiculous accusation made to those 93: criminal association with the aim of devastation.
We are not enticed by a desire for compensation and revenge, we are not anxious to see those who built fabricated evidence in prison, but we do hope that it will finally be possible to find out why such a serious violation of the constitutional state was committed. Why were so many young people massacred, seized and confined? Why was false evidence fabricated? (the molotovs found in corso Italia, moved during the night to the school building). Why were the hard disks of the Genoa Social Forum's media centre stolen and never found again? Why did the police, instead of looking for the Black Blocks where the GSF had reported their presence, prefer a bloody butchering in a dormitory? What is the role of the foreign intelligence services? Who gave the orders? These are only a few of the questions, the answers to which may enable us to understand the real motivations of the way public order was managed in defence of the summit of the heads of state of the eight richest nations. This is why we repeat our request for the arrangement of a parliamentary commission of inquiry on the events that took place during the G8.

AGI - Genoa, 12 May
The chief prosecutor of Genoa, Francesco Lalla, had requested dismissal for the 93 "no-globals" of the Diaz school, who had been charged with aggravated resistance, grand larceny and possession of offensive weapons, because the charges Â«lacked subjective individuation of those responsible for the various alleged crimes described in the initial communicationÂ». But the magistrate in charge of preliminary investigations, Anna Ivaldi, who filed the dismissal today, went further, and recognised that that night at the Diaz school no act of resistance was made by the people caught in the gym-dormitory. She came to this conclusion after having reconstructed the episode of the 21 July 2001 blitz, also stating that the setting up of an inquiry on the false molotovs impounded in the school, with the charge of perjury connected to the records signed by the police, Â«makes it impossible to draw any certainty from said records concerning the real course of eventsÂ», and also mentioning that the police officers are themselves under investigation for the events which took place at the Diaz school.(AGI) Cli/Glc/Sic Follows 121530 MAY 03 NNN

(AGI) - Genoa, 12 May
Counter to the police records there were the statements made by the 93 people arrested; according to their story, recorded in the document, the police first of all broke through the school gate with a van, then ,with no previous notice, entered the school by breaking down the door, behind which someone had placed some desks and benches, then the police started beating up the young people, who were waiting with raised arms or lying on the floor, and chased after those who ran away in search of shelter. According to the magistrate this story is confirmed by the concordance of the statements, Â«in particular of those made in the place where the arrest was confirmed; on this point it is to be stressed that the 78 foreigners arrested were taken to four different prisons (Pavia, Voghera, Vercelli, Genoa Marassi), while some of them were questioned while they were in the Genoa hospitals. This circumstance makes it fully unlikely that they may have agreed on their version, and it therefore bestows particular value on the fact that these stories agree even on specific points. Furthermore Â», magistrate Ivaldi points out, Â«as soon as they were released, the foreigners received a deportation order, a circumstance that makes it possible to exclude that they may have agreed on a version of the facts with those 15 Italians who were subsequently heard by the Public Prosecutor. The magistrate finds further confirmation in the statements of many of the police officers: Â«With regards to these statements it must be said first of all - writes the magistrate - that although they are not actual admissions, they have particular value, since those who made them substantially belie the version given in the recordsÂ». Examining the statements made by the police officers, the magistrate points out to how conflicting they are with each other. Â«All ascribing to others the fact of having entered (the school) first, and thus hindering identification of the officers who entered first after the doors were broken downÂ». The Rome mobile unit under the command of Vincenzo Canterini, personnel from the police mobile squads from different police headquarters and men of the SCO, the Central Operative Service directed by Franco Gratteri, took part in the operation.(AGI) Cli/Sic/Glc Follows 121531 MAY 0 NNN

(AGI) - Genoa, 12 May
The only points on which the statements of the officers agree on, the magistrate points out, is that Â«when the contingent arrived, some unidentified people closed the gate that led to the courtyard in front of the Diaz school and then ran into the school; the gate was broken through with a van, while the school doors were closed from the inside: a few minutes after the police had entered, some of the young people present in the school were seen to be wounded, some in serious conditionsÂ». Even the statements made by the police officers on the throwing of objects they supposedly suffered before they entered the school appear to conflict. The object throwing is described differently by some officers, and denied by all the arrested "no globals". Â«There are photographs, in the documents, that were taken by the Provincial Headquarters of the Carabinieri on the morning of the 23rd, some of which show the front courtyard of the Diaz school - the magistrate writes - in said photographs there are sheets of paper, trash bags and, near a wall, even three damaged PC screens may be seen, so that it seems likely that during the brief time gone by after the events of the night between the 21st and 22nd nobody cleaned up the courtyard, on which however there is no trace of the dangerous objects (stones, bottles, pieces of concrete, all non-exhibited evidence) that were supposedly thrown Â». So, from an analysis of the medical reports concerning the injuries suffered by the officers, that concern 17 policemen, the magistrate writes that it is not possible to maintain, not even with a minimum degree of uncertainty, that those who were in the Diaz school and who were then arrested had thrown objects against the policeÂ». Going back to what happened in the school, the magistrate found further confirmation for her conclusions both in the records of some officers who signed the record of arrest, and though having noted the consequences of violence on the arrested Â«said nothing about traces of acts of resistance that these supposedly had made Â» and in the medical reports of those 62 young demonstrators who had to resort to hospital care: Â«Almost all the reports have indications of a concussion, and many have also fracture of the upper limbs, characteristic of people who try to defend themselves from blows by protecting their head with their armsÂ». With regards to the charge of grand larceny (concerning some tools taken from a construction site near the school) the magistrate points out that there are no Â«elements on the basis of which the theft can be ascribed to the 93 currently under investigation or to some of themÂ». Finally even the charge of possession of offensive weapons is dropped. Â«With regards to the impounded material, the only possible charge that remains (since most of the material - thermos flasks, clothes, scuba-diving masks, mobile phones, cameras, film and floppy disks - was totally irrelevant) is the violation described in art. 4 Law 110/1975 (since some multi-purpose Swiss knives were found), a violation that does not legitimate arrest in the act. (AGI) Cli/Glc 121532 MAY 03 NNN